The Frogs THE FROGS A summary of the play by Aristophanes This document was originally published in The Drama: Its History, Literature and Influence on Civilization, vol. 2. ed. Alfred Bates. London: Historical Publishing Company, 1906. pp. 30-31. The play of the Frogs turns upon the decline of tragic art. Euripides was dead; so were Sophocles and Agathon ; there remained none but second-rate tragedians. Bacchus misses Euripides, and wishes to bring him back from the infernal world. In this he imitates Hercules , but though equipped with the lion-hide and club of the hero, he is very unlike him in character, and as a dastardly voluptuary, gives rise to much laughter. Here we may see the boldness of the comedian in the right point of view; he does not scruple to attack the guardian god of his own art, in honor of whom the play was exhibited, for it was the common belief that the gods understood fun as well, if not better, than men. Bacchus rows himself over the Acherusian lake, where the frogs pleasantly greet him with their croaking.

The proper chorus, however, consists of the shades of the initiated in the Eleusinian mysteries, and odes of wonderful beauty are assigned to them. Aeschylus had at first assumed the tragic throne in the lower world, but now Euripides is for thrusting him off. Pluto purposes that Bacchus should decide this great contest; the two poets, the sublimely wrathful Aeschylus, the subtle, vain Euripides stand opposite each other and submit specimens of their art; they sing, they declaim against each other, and all their failings are characterized in masterly style. At last a balance is brought, on which each lays a verse; but let Euripides take what pains he will to produce his most ponderous lines, a verse of Aeschylus instantly jerks up the scale of his antagonist. Finally he grows weary of the contest, and tells Euripides he may mount into the balance himself with all his works, his wife, children and servant, Cephisophon, and he will lay against them only two verses.

Bacchus, in the meantime, has come over to the cause of Aeschylus, and though he had sworn to Euripides that he would take him back with him from the lower world, he dispatches him with an allusion to his own verse from the Hippolytus . Aeschylus, therefore, returns to the living world and resigns the tragic throne to Sophocles during his absence. Aristophanes Aristophanes Nationality: Ancient Greece Executive summary: Lysistrata, The Frogs The great comic dramatist and poet of Athens. His birth year is uncertain. He is known to have been about the same age as Eupolis, and is said to have been "almost a boy" when his first comedy (The Banqueters) was brought out in 427 BC. His father Philippus was a landowner in Aegina. Aristophanes was an Athenian citizen of the tribe Pandionis, and the deme Cydathene.

The stories which made him a native of Camirus in Rhodes; or of the Egyptian Naucratis, had probably no other foundation than an indictment for usurpation of civic rights which appears to have been more than once laid against him by Cleon . His three sons -- Philippus, Araros and Nicostratus -- were all comic poets. Philippus, the eldest, was a rival of Eubulus, who began to exhibit in 376 BC. Araros brought out two of his father's latest comedies -- the Cocalus and the Aeolosicon, and in 375 began to exhibit works of his own. Nicostratus, the youngest, is assigned by Athenaeus to the Middle Comedy, but belongs, as is shown by some of the names and characters of his pieces, to the New Comedy also. Although tragedy and comedy had their common origin in the festivals of Dionysus, the regular establishment of tragedy at Athens preceded by half a century that of comedy. The Old Comedy may be said to have lasted about eighty years (470-390 BC), and to have flourished about fifty-six (460-404 BC).

Of the forty poets who are named as having illustrated it the chief were Cratinus , Eupolis and Aristophanes. The Middle Comedy covers a period of about seventy years (390-320 BC), its chief poets being Antiphanes, Alexis, Theopompus and Strattis. The New Comedy was in vigor for about seventy years (320-250 BC), having for its foremost representatives Menander , Philemon and Diphilus. The Old Comedy was possible only for a thorough democracy. Its essence was a satirical censorship, unsparing in personalities, of public and of private life -- of morality, of statesmanship, of education, of literature, of social usage -- in a word, of everything which had an interest for the city or which could amuse the citizens. Preserving all the freedom of banter and of riotous fun to which its origin gave it an historical right, it aimed at associating with this a strong practical purpose -- the expression of a democratic public opinion in such a form that no misconduct or folly could altogether disregard it.

That licentiousness, that grossness of allusion which too often disfigures it, was, it should be remembered, exacted by the sentiment of the Dionysiac festivals, as much as a decorous cheerfulness is expected at the holiday times of other worships. This was the popular element. Without this the entertainment would have been found flat and unseasonable. But for a comic poet of the higher calibre the consciousness of a recognized power which he could exert, and the desire to use this power for the good of the city, must always have been the uppermost feelings. At Athens the poet of the Old Comedy had an influence analogous, perhaps, rather to that of the journalist than to that of the modern dramatist. But the established type of Dionysiac comedy gave him an instrument such as no public satirist has ever wielded. When Moli�re wished to brand hypocrisy he could only make his Tartuffe the central figure of a regular drama, developed by a regular process to a just catastrophe. He had no choice between touching too lightly and using sustained force to make a profound impression. The Athenian dramatist of the Old Comedy worked under no such limitations of form.

The wildest flights of extravagance were permitted to him. Nothing bound him to a dangerous emphasis or a wearisome insistence. He could deal the keenest thrust, or make the most earnest appeal, and at the next moment -- if his instinct told him that it was time to change the subject -- vary the serious strain by burlesque. He had, in short, an incomparable scope for trenchant satire directed by sure tact. Aristophanes is for us the representative of the Old Comedy. But his genius, while it includes, also transcends the genius of the Old Comedy. He can denounce the frauds of a Cleon, he can vindicate the duty of Athens to herself and to her allies, with a stinging scorn and a force of patriotic indignation which makes the poet almost forgotten in the citizen. He can banter Euripides with an ingenuity of light mockery which makes it seem for the time as if the leading Aristophanic trait was the art of seeing all things from their prosaic side. Yet it is neither in the denunciation nor in the mockery that he is most individual.

His truest and highest faculty is revealed by those wonderful bits of lyric writing in which he soars above everything that can move laughter or tears, and makes the clear air thrill with the notes of a song as free, as musical and as wild as that of the nightingale invoked by his own chorus in the Birds. The speech of Dikaios Logos in the Clouds, the praises of country life in the Peace, the serenade in the Ecclesiazusae, the songs of the Spartan and Athenian maidens in the Lysistrata, above all, perhaps, the chorus in the Frogs, the beautiful chant of the Initiated -- these passages, and such as these, are the true glories of Aristophanes. They are the strains, not of an artist, but of one who warbles for pure gladness of heart in some place made bright by the presence of a god. Nothing else in Greek poetry has quite this wild sweetness of the woods. Of modern poets Shakespeare alone, perhaps, has it in combination with a like richness and fertility of fancy. Fifty-four comedies were ascribed to Aristophanes. Forty-three of these are allowed as genuine by Bergk. Eleven only are extant.

These eleven form a running commentary on the outer and the inner life of Athens during thirty-six years. They may be ranged under three periods. The first, extending to 420 BC, includes those plays in which Aristophanes uses an absolutely unrestrained freedom of political satire. The second ends with the year 405. Its productions are distinguished from those of the earlier time by a certain degree of reticence and caution. The third period, down to 388 BC, comprises two plays in which the transition to the character of the Middle Comedy is well marked, not merely by disuse of the parabasis, but by general self-restraint. I. First Period. (1) 425 BC. The Acharnians. Since the defeat in Boeotia the peace party at Athens had gained ground, and in this play Aristophanes seeks to strengthen their hands. Dicaeopolis, an honest countryman, is determined to make peace with Sparta on his own account, not deterred by the angry men of Acharnae, who crave vengeance for the devastation of their vineyards.

He sends to Sparta for samples of peace; and he is so much pleased with the flavor of the Thirty Years' sample that he at once concludes a treaty for himself and his family. All the blessings of life descend on him; while Lamachus, the leader of the war party, is smarting from cold, snow and wounds. (2) 424 BC. The Knights. Three years before, in his Babylonians, Aristophanes had assailed Cleon as the typical demagogue. In this play he continues the attack. The Demos, or State, is represented by an old man who has put himself and his household into the hands of a rascally Paphlagonian steward. Nicias and Demosthenes, slaves of Demos, contrive that the Paphlagonian shall be supplanted in their master's favor by a sausage-seller. No sooner has Demos been thus rescued than his youthfulness and his good sense return together. (3) 423 BC. The Clouds (the first edition; a second edition was brought out in 422 BC).

This play would be correctly described as an attack on the new spirit of intellectual inquiry and culture rather than on a school or class. Two classes of thinkers or teachers are, however, specially satirized under the general name of "Sophist." 1. The Physical Philosophers -- indicated by allusions to the doctrines of Anaxagoras , Heraclitus and Diogenes of Apollonia. 2. The professed teachers of rhetoric, belles lettres, etc., such as Protagoras and Prodicus. Socrates is taken as the type of the entire tendency. A youth named Pheidippides -- obviously meant for Alcibiades is sent by his father to Socrates to be cured of his dissolute propensities. Under the discipline of Socrates the youth becomes accomplished in dishonesty and impiety. The conclusion of the play shows the indignant father preparing to burn up the philosopher and his hall of contemplation. (4) 422 BC. The Wasps. This comedy, which suggested Les Plaideurs to Racine , is a satire on the Athenian love of litigation.

The strength of demagogy, while it lay chiefly in the ecclesia, lay partly also in the paid dicasteries. From this point of view the Wasps may be regarded as supplementing the Knights. Philocleon (admirer of Cleon), an old man, has a passion for lawsuits -- a passion which his son, Bdelycleon (detester of Cleon) fails to check, until he hits upon the device of turning the house into a law court, and paying his father for absence from the public suits. The house dog steals a Sicilian cheese; the old man is enabled to gratify his taste by trying the case, and, by an oversight, acquits the defendant. In the second half of the play a change comes over the dream of Philocleon; from litigation he turns to literature and music, and is congratulated by the chorus on his happy conversion. (5) 421 BC. The Peace. In its advocacy of peace with Sparta, this play, acted at the Great Dionysia shortly before the conclusion of the treaty, continues the purpose of the Acharnians. Trygaeus, a distressed Athenian, soars to the sky on a beetle's back.

There he finds the gods engaged in pounding the Greek states in a mortar. In order to stop this, he frees the goddess Peace from a well in which she is imprisoned. The pestle and mortar are laid aside by the gods, and Trygaeus marries one of the handmaids of Peace. II. Second Period. (6) 414 BC. The Birds. Peisthetaerus, an enterprising Athenian, and his friend Euelpides persuade the birds to build a city -- "Cloud-Cuckoo-borough" -- in mid-air, so as to cut off the gods from men. The plan succeeds; the gods send envoys to treat with the birds; and Peisthetaerus marries Basileia, daughter of Zeus. Some have found in the Birds a complete historical allegory of the Sicilian expedition; others, a general satire on the prevalence at Athens of headstrong caprice over law and order; others, merely an aspiration towards a new and purified Athens -- a dream to which the poet had turned from his hope for a revival of the Athens of the past. In another view, the piece is mainly a protest against the religious fanaticism which the incident of the Hermae had called forth.

(7) 411 BC. The Lysistrata. This play was brought out during the earlier stages of those intrigues which led to the revolution of the Four Hundred. It appeared shortly before Peisander had arrived in Athens from the camp at Samos for the purpose of organizing the oligarchic policy. The Lysistrata expresses the popular desire for peace at any cost. As the men can do nothing, the women take the question into their own hands, occupy the citadel, and bring the citizens to surrender. (8) 411 BC. The Thesmophoriazusae (Priestesses of Demeter). This came out three months later than the Lysistrata, during the reign of terror established by the oligarchic conspirators, but before their blow had been struck. The political meaning of the play lies in the absence of political allusion. Fear silences even comedy. Only women and Euripides are satirized. Euripides is accused and condemned at the female festival of the Thesmophoria. (9) 405 BC. The Frogs.

This piece was brought out just when Athens had made her last effort in the Peloponnesian War, eight months before the battle of Aegospotami, and about fifteen months before the taking of Athens by Lysander. It may be considered as an attempt to distract men's minds from public affairs. It is a literary criticism. Aeschylus and Euripides were both lately dead. Athens is beggared of poets; and Dionysus goes down to Hades to bring back a poet. Aeschylus and Euripides contend in the under-world for the throne of tragedy; and the victory is at last awarded to Aeschylus. III. Third Period. (10) 393 BC. The Ecclesiazusae (women in parliament). The women, disguised as men, steal into the ecclesia, and succeed in decreeing a new constitution. At this time the demagogue Agyrrhius led the assembly; and the play is, in fact, a satire on the general demoralization of public life. (11) 388 BC. The Plutus (Wealth).

The first edition of the play had appeared in 408 BC, being a symbolical representation of the fact that the victories won by Alcibiades in the Hellespont had brought back the god of wealth to the treasure chamber of the Parthenon. In its extant form the Plutus is simply a moral allegory. Chremylus, a worthy but poor man, falls in with a blind and aged wanderer, who proves to be the god of wealth. Asclepius restores eyesight to Plutus; whereupon all the just are made rich and all the unjust are reduced to poverty. Among the lost plays, the following are the chief of which anything is known: 1. 427 BC. The Banqueters. A satire on young Athens. A father has two sons; one is brought up in the good old school, another in the tricky subtleties of the new; and the contrast of results is the chief theme. 2. 426 BC. The Babylonians. Under this name the subject-allies of Athens are represented as "Babylonians" -- barbarian slaves, employed to grind in the mill.

The oppression of the allies by the demagogues -- a topic often touched elsewhere -- was, then, the main subject of the piece, in which Aristophanes is said to have attacked especially the system of appointing to offices by lot. The comedy is memorable as opening that Aristophanic war upon Cleon which was continued in the Knights and the Wasps. The Merchantmen, The Farmers, The Preliminary Contest (Proagon), and possibly the Old Age (Geras), belonged to the First Period. The Geras is assigned by S�vern to 422 BC, and is supposed to have been a picture of dotage similar to that in the Knights. A comedy called The Islands is conjectured to have dealt with the sufferings imposed by the war on the insular tributaries. The Triphales was probably a satire on Alcibiades; the Storks, on the tragic poet Patrocles. In the Aeolosicon -- produced by his son Araros in 387 BC, Aristophanes probably parodied the Aeolus of Euripides. The Cocalus is thought to have been a parody of the legend, according to which a Sicilian king of that name slew Minos.

A sympathetic reader of Aristophanes can hardly fail to perceive that, while his political and intellectual tendencies are well marked, his opinions, in so far as they color his comedies, are too indefinite to reward, or indeed to tolerate, analysis. Aristophanes was a natural conservative. His ideal was the Athens of the Persian wars. He disapproved the policy which had made Athenian empire irksome to the allies and formidable to Greece; he detested the vulgarity and the violence of mob rule; he clave to the old worship of the gods; he regarded the new ideas of education as a tissue of imposture and impiety. How far he was from clearness or precision of view in regard to the intellectual revolution which was going forward, appears from the Clouds, in which thinkers and literary workers who had absolutely nothing in common are treated with sweeping ridicule as prophets of a common heresy. Aristophanes is one of the men for whom opinion is mainly a matter of feeling, not of reason.

His imaginative susceptibility gave him a warm and loyal love for the traditional glories of Athens, however dim the past to which they belonged; a horror of what was ugly or ignoble in the present; a keen perception of what was offensive or absurd in pretension. The broad preferences and dislikes thus generated were enough not only to point the moral of comedy, but to make hint, in many cases, a really useful censor for the city. The service which he could render in this way was, however, only negative. He could hardly be, in any positive sense, a political or a moral teacher for Athens. His rooted antipathy to intellectual progress, while it affords easy and wide scope for his wit, must after all, lower his intellectual rank. The great minds are not the enemies of ideas. But as a mocker -- to use the word which seems most closely to describe him on this side -- he is incomparable for the union of subtlety with riot of the comic imagination. As a poet, he is immortal.

And, among Athenian poets, he has it for his distinctive characteristic that he is inspired less by that Greek genius which never allows fancy to escape from the control of defining, though spiritualizing, reason, than by such ethereal rapture of the unfettered fancy as lifts Shakespeare or Shelley above it, "Pouring his full heart / In profuse strains of unpremeditated art." Father: Philippus Aristophanes, photo, biography A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Aristophanes ( Ancient Greek dramatist, the founder of the comic lines of poetry in world literature, `the father of comedy ') Biography Aristophanes Aristophanes was born in Attica in the deme Kidafine approximately 448 g. BC. BC), a wealthy family. Philip, the father of Aristophanes, owned plot of land on the island of Aegina. Aristophanes was kleruhom - Athenian colonists on the island of Aegina. One of the inscription at the beginning of IV.

mentions his name as a member of the Council of Five Hundred pritanov (duty) phylum Pandionidy. . Aristophanes began to write still very young and the first product (427-425 gg.) - "Piruyuschie", . "Babylon" (426) and "Acharnians" (425), . of which survived only recently, . - Put the name Kallistrat, . because he was unknown and was not able to pay for the chorus., . In 426 g . BC. After the play "The Babylonians, Aristophanes was prosecuted leader Cleon, the Athenian demos, ridiculed in comedy, on trial for insulting the people and their representatives to the Allies. Details of the court are not known, apparently, Aristophanes rather lightly on the charges. He also appeared occasionally as an actor (for example, played a role Paphlagonians-Cleon in "Rider" (424)). When setting 423 g. BC. play "The Clouds" failed, and Aristophanes had to alter some text.

The last of the extant works, the comedy "Wealth", was delivered to them in 388 g. BC. Then he wrote another comedy "Coca" and "Eolosikon, but they have been delivered after the death of his son Aristophanes Arar (all he had 3 sons, and all three - comedy). Died Aristophanes in approximately 385 - 380 g. BC. Total Aristophanes wrote more than 40 comedies, but up to now remained only eleven: "Arhanyane" ( "The Acharnians", 425), "Horsemen" ( "The Knights", 424), "Clouds" ( "The Clouds", 1 st ed. 423), . "Wasps" ( "The Wasps", . 422), . "The World" ( "The Peace", . 421), . "The Birds" ( "The Birds", . 414), . "Lysistrata" ( "Lysistrata", . 411), . "Women on the holiday Fesmofory" ( "The Thesmorphoriazusae", .

ok.411), . "Frogs" ( "The Frogs", . 405), . "Women in the People's Assembly" ( "The Ecclesiazusa", . 392 or 389), . "Wealth" ( "Plutus", . 388)., . In his comedies of Aristophanes ridicules as upstarts, ranters and ignorant of the lower classes and the aristocrats and 'gold' youth. . Aristophanes - Ancient History Encyclopedia Aristophanes by Mark Cartwright published on 13 March 2013 Aristophanes was the most famous writer of Old Comedy plays in ancient Greece and his surviving works are the only examples of that style. His innovative and sometimes rough comedy could also hide more sophisticated digs at the political elite and deal with social issues such as cultural change and the role of women in society. Indeed, the plays of Aristophanes are not only a record of Greek theatre but also provide an invaluable insight into many of the political and social aspects of ancient Greece, from the practicalities of jury service to details of religious rituals in major festivals.

Life & Character Little is known about Aristophanes beyond what can be gleaned from his plays and a fictional portrait in Plato ’s Symposium . From the dates of his works we may surmise that he was born between 460 and 450 BCE and died sometime between 386 and 380 BCE. He was from Athens and he may have spent a period of his youth on Aegina following his father Philippus’ move there. No contemporary physical portrait survives, but we may surmise from comments in some of his works that he was bald. Remove Ads Advertisement The poet is presented as a rather amiable chap, sociable, and someone who ‘divides his time between Aphrodite and Dionysos ’. Plato presents a fictional gathering of historical characters in his Symposium, but Aristophanes was still well known at the time of its creation (380s BCE) and, therefore, we may assume that the portrayal of Aristophanes reflected this fact and was recognisably accurate. The poet is presented as a rather amiable chap, sociable, and someone who ‘divides his time between Aphrodite and Dionysos’, i.e. likes women, boys, and wine.

That Plato was favourably disposed to Aristophanes is evidenced in the positive tones of the epitaph he later wrote for the great poet. Plato did, however, in his Apology, blame the poet for fuelling a public distrust of Socrates . Aristophanes' Plays More concrete are the works of Aristophanes. Although we know that he wrote more, eleven plays survive and they are the only examples of the so-called Old Comic style which gave way, in the 4th century BCE, to a newer, more sophisticated form of comic plays which focussed on intrigue and recurring characters. In contrast, the Old Comedies were by that time looked on as being rather vulgar and lacking in sophistication, Aristotle was one of their staunchest critics. However, it is these older comedies which have perhaps better stood the test of time and appear to the modern reader to be much more contemporary. Aristophanes’ surviving full plays are: The Archarnians (425 BCE) about the formation of a peace treaty. The Knights (424 BCE) an attack on Cleon. The Clouds (423 BCE) criticising Socrates for corruption and sophistry.

The Wasps (422 BCE) poking fun at the Athenian jury system and the Athenians’ preoccupation with litigation. Peace (421 BCE) on the peace with Sparta . The Birds (414 BCE) where birds construct a new city in the sky and better the gods. Lysistrata (411 BCE) where women across Greece go on a sex strike to compel their men to make peace. The Poet & The Women or Thesmophoriazusae (411 BCE) where women debate the elimination of Euripides The Frogs (405 BCE) where Dionysos visits Hades and judges a poetry competition between Aeschylus and Euripedes. The Ecclesiazusae (c. 392 BCE) where women take over Athens and make all property communal. Plutus or Wealth (388 BCE) where the god of wealth regains his sight and no longer distributes riches at random.

We know of other titles which have not survived, for example, his first play The Banqueters (427 BCE), and we know that there were two final plays after Plutus which were a little more in line with the new style of comedy. Several of his plays were produced by Callistratus, others by Philonides or Aristophanes himself, and many won prizes at prestigious festivals such as the City Dionysia of Athens. Remove Ads Advertisement Aristophanes was most probably instrumental in the evolution of the Greek comic theatre, for example, in the role of the chorus and the reduction in topical references. Using parody, puns, and bold and colourful language, he was able to convey the full spectrum of emotions and, through satire and ridiculous exaggeration, he poked fun at the more ridiculous facets of Greek city-life. Few public figures escaped his sharp wit, and politicians such as Kleon and fellow artists like Euripides were a favourite target as were, on occasion, the populace as a whole.

The following selection of extracts illustrates the poet’s sly wit: Sosias: Well, I’d no sooner fallen asleep than I saw a whole lot of sheep, and they were holding an assembly on the Pnyx: they all had little cloaks on, and they had staves in their hands; and these sheep were all listening to a harangue by a rapacious-looking creature with a figure like a whale and a voice like a scalded sow. (41; Act One, Scene One, The Wasps) A dig at democracy and the voters being easily swayed by a good speaker. Aristophanes Biography - Aristophanes Childhood, Life & Timeline Writers Aristophanes Biography Aristophanes was an ancient Greek comic playwright and poet also known as the Father of the Comedy. Read more about this prolific writer in the following article. Quick Facts father Philippus Aristophanes was an acclaimed Greek comic playwright and poet. Among his originally written forty plays, only eleven are still extant. These, along with fragments of some of his other plays, provide the real evidences of a genre of comic drama known as Old Comedy. Aristophanes is also popularly known as the Father of Comedy and the Prince of Ancient Comedy.

It was believed that Aristophanes recreated the life of ancient Athens more convincingly than any other author. Even the influential contemporaries like Plato acknowledged his powers of ridicule. Some of his important extant plays are The Acharnians (425 BC), The Knights (424 BC), The Clouds (423 BC), The Wasps (422 BC), Peace (421 BC), The Birds (414 BC), Lysistrata (411 BC), The Frogs (405 BC) and Wealth II (388 BC). Aristophanes Childhood & Life There is not much information available about Aristophanes. The major sources of information about him are his plays. Son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, Aristophanes was probably born around ca. 446 BC. There is no certainty about the exact location of his birth. He was a comic poet in the times when it was normal for a poet to assume the role of 'teacher'. Even though this is specifically referred to his training of the Chorus in rehearsal, it also described his relationship with the audience as a commentator on significant issues.

Aristophanes often flaunted his originality as a dramatist, but his plays consistently followed opposition to radical new influences in Athenian society. He caricatured leading figures in the fields of art, politic and philosophy such as Euripides, Cleon and Socrates. These caricatures imply that Aristophanes was an old-fashioned conservative. It is said that he mainly wrote the plays for entertaining the audience and to win prestigious competitions. These plays, produced at the great dramatic festivals of Athens, the Lenaia and City Dionysia, were judged and ranked amongst the relative works of other comic dramatists. For most part of his career, the Chorus played a pivotal role in his play's success. The Chorus was recruited and financed by a choregus, a wealthy citizen appointed to the task by one of the archons. Even though a choregus would consider his personal expenditure on the Chorus as a civic duty and a public honor, Aristophanes showed in “The Knights” that wealthy citizens accept civic responsibilities as punishment imposed on them by demagogues and populists like Cleon.

At the time of the production of his first play “The Banqueters”, Athens was an ambitious, imperial power and The Peloponnesian War was only in its fourth year. His plays expressed pride in the achievement of the older generation but were not jingoistic and staunchly opposed to the war with Sparta. In his plays, Aristophanes heavily criticized war profiteers especially the populists like Cleon. In 427 BC, his first play “The Banqueters” (now lost) helped him to win second prize at the City Dionysia. He again won the first prize there with his next play, The Babylonians (also now lost). It was very common for foreign dignitaries to attend the City Dionysia and his play, “The Babylonians” caused some embarrassment for the Athenian authorities since it had described the cities of the Athenian League as slaves grinding at a mill. Some influential citizens, particularly Cleon, accused the play for slandering the polis and possibly a legal action was taken against Aristophanes. There are no recorded details about the trial. Aristophanes repeatedly attacked Cleon in his later plays.

But these satirical fulminations were ineffective to cause any harm on Cleon's political career. Even after the production of “The Knights”, a play full of anti-Cleon jokes, Cleon was elected to the prestigious board of ten generals. However, Cleon seemed to have had no real power to limit or control Aristophanes or his plays. As such, the latter kept on producing caricatures of Cleon even after his death. Based on the combined resources of the two plays, “The Knights” and “The Clouds”, it was believed that Aristophanes didn’t direct the first three of his plays, and instead, these were directed by Callistratus and Philoneides. Based on the comments made by the Chorus on behalf of Aristophanes in “The Clouds”, it have been interpreted that he was not more than 18 years old when he wrote his first play, “The Banqueters”. Also, it is believed that Aristophanes was probably victorious at least three times at the Lenaia, with “Acharnians” in 425, “The Knights” in 424, and “The Frogs” in 405.

“Frogs” even held the unique distinction of having a repeated performance at a subsequent festival. By the time Aristophanes wrote his last play around 386 BC, Athens had been defeated in war and its empire had been broken apart. Subsequently, Athens underwent a transformation from the political to the intellectual centre of Greece. Aristophanes was a significant part of this transformation and shared in the intellectual fashions of the period. Aristophanes’s son, Araros was also a comic poet and was heavily involved in the production of his father's play “Wealth II” in 388. Araros is also said to be responsible for the posthumous performances of the now lost plays “Aeolosicon II” and “Cocalus”. Probably, the last play won the prize at the City Dionysia in 387. It is also believed that his second son, Philippus, won twice at the Lenaia and probably directed some of Eubulus’ comedies. Plato's “The Symposium” can be considered as a useful source of biographical information about Aristophanes but its reliability is uncertain.

For instance, it describes the recorded conversations of a dinner party at which both Aristophanes and Socrates are guests. This party was held some several years after the performance of “The Clouds”, the play in which Socrates was cruelly caricatured. One of the guests at the party, Alcibiades, teased Socrates over his appearance referring to some quotes from the play but still there were no signs of ill-feeling between Socrates and Aristophanes. Plato had described Aristophanes as a genial person. But Plato was only a boy at the time of the events in “The Symposium” and there were likely chances that his character of Aristophanes is based on reading of the plays. Aristophanes survived The Peloponnesian War, also the two oligarchic revolutions and the two democratic restorations, hence it can interpreted that he was not actively involved in politics despite his highly political plays. It is said that he was appointed to the Council of Five Hundred for a year at the beginning of the fourth century but such appointments were very common in democratic Athens. There are not any reliable details available about the exact location and time of his death.

But it was believed that he died around 386 BC. ARISTOPHANES TIMELINE Aristophanes Quotes ARISTOPHANES QUOTES Greek comic dramatist (450 B.C. - 388 B.C.) « A man's homeland is wherever he prospers. ARISTOPHANES, Plutus Hunger knows no friend but its feeder. ARISTOPHANES, The Wasps High thoughts must have high language. ARISTOPHANES, The Frogs Under every stone lurks a politician. ARISTOPHANES, Thesmophoriazusae One must not try to trick misfortune, but resign oneself to it with good grace. ARISTOPHANES, The Thesmophoriazusae It is bad taste for a poet to be coarse and hairy. ARISTOPHANES, The Thesmophoriazusae Times change. The vices of your age are stylish today. ARISTOPHANES, The Clouds 5 likes like The gods, my dear simple fellow, are a mere expression coined by vulgar superstition. We frown upon such coinage here.

ARISTOPHANES, The Clouds Tags: God When the soldier returns from the wars, even though he has white hair, he very soon finds a young wife. But a woman has only one summer; if she does not make hay while the sun shines, no one will afterwards have anything to say to her, and she spends her days consulting oracles that never send her a husband. ARISTOPHANES, Lysistrata By words the mind is winged. ARISTOPHANES, The Birds Tags: words Weak mortals, chained to the earth, creatures of clay as frail as the foliage of the woods, you unfortunate race, whose life is but darkness, as unreal as a shadow, the illusion of a dream. ARISTOPHANES, The Birds You will never make the crab walk straight. ARISTOPHANES, Peace 3 likes like Do not bandy words with your father, nor treat him as a dotard, nor reproach the old man, who has cherished you, with his age. ARISTOPHANES, The Clouds 2 likes like Men of sense often learn from their enemies.

It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls and ships of war. ARISTOPHANES, The Birds The Birds - Aristophanes - Ancient Greece - Classical Literature MESSENGERS CHORUS OF BIRDS The play begins with two middle-aged men, Pisthetaerus and Euelpides (roughly translated as Trustyfriend and Goodhope), stumbling across a hillside wilderness in search of Tereus, the legendary Thracian king who was once metamorphosed into the hoopoe bird. Disillusioned with life in Athens and its law courts, politics, false oracles and military antics, they hope to make a new start in life somewhere else and believe that the Hoopoe/Tereus can advise them. A large and threatening-looking bird, who turns out to be the Hoopoe's servant, demands to know what they are up to and accuses them of being bird-catchers. He is persuaded to fetch his master and the Hoopoe himself appears (a not very convincing bird who attributes his paucity of feathers to a severe case of molting). The Hoopoe tells of his life with the birds, and their easy existence of eating and loving.

Pisthetaerus suddenly has the brilliant idea that the birds should stop flying about like simpletons and instead build themselves a great city in the sky. This would not only allow them to lord it over men, it would also enable them to blockade the Olympian gods, starving them into submission in the same way as the Athenians had recently starved the island of Melos into surrender. The Hoopoe likes the idea and he agrees to help them implement it, provided that the two Athenians can convince all the other birds. He and his wife, the Nightingale, start to assemble the world's birds which form into a Chorus as they arrive. The newly arrived birds are outraged at the presence of men, for mankind has long been their enemy, but the Hoopoe persuades them to give his human guests a fair hearing. Pisthetaerus explains how the birds were the original gods and advises them to reclaim their lost powers and privileges from the upstart Olympians. The audience of birds is won over and they urge the Athenians to lead them against the usurping gods.

While the Chorus delivers a brief account of the genealogy of the birds, establishing their claim to divinity ahead of the Olympians, and cites some of the benefits of being a bird, Pisthetaerus and Euelpides go to chew on a magical root of the Hoopoe that will transform them into birds. When they return, sporting a rather unconvincing resemblance to a bird, they begin to organize the construction of their city-in-the-sky, which they name �Cloud Cuckoo Land�. Pisthetaerus leads a religious service in honour of birds as the new gods, during which he is pestered by a variety of unwelcome human visitors looking for employment in the new city, including a young poet looking to become the city�s official poet, an oracle-monger with prophecies for sale, a famous geometer offering a set of town-plans, an imperial inspector from Athens with an eye for a quick profit and a statute-seller. As these insidious interlopers try to impose Athenian ways upon his bird kingdom, Pisthetaerus rudely dispatches them.

The Chorus of birds steps forward to promulgate various laws forbidding crimes against their kind (such as catching, caging, stuffing or eating them) and advise the festival judges to award the play first place or risk getting crapped on. A messenger reports that the new city walls are already finished thanks to the collaborative efforts of numerous kinds of birds, but a second messenger then arrives with news that one of the Olympian gods has sneaked through the defences. The goddess Iris is caught and brought down under guard to face Pisthetaerus� interrogation and insults, before being allowed to fly off to her father Zeus to complain about her treatment. A third messenger then arrives to report that multitudes of unwelcome visitors are now arriving, including a rebellious youth who believes that here at last he has permission to beat up his father, the famous poet Cinesias babbling incoherent verse, and an Athenian sycophant in raptures at the thought of being able to prosecute victims on the wing, but they are all sent packing by Pisthetaerus. Prometheus arrives next, hiding himself from his enemy Zeus, to let Pisthetaerus know that the Olympians are now starving because men's offerings are no longer reaching them.

He advises Pisthetaerus, however, not to negotiate with the gods until Zeus surrenders both his sceptre and his girl, Basileia (Sovereignty), the real power in Zeus' household. Finally, a delegation from Zeus himself arrives, composed of Zeus� brother Poseidon, the oafish Heracles and the even more oafish god of the barbarian Triballians. Psithetaerus easily outwits Heracles , who in turn bullies the barbarian god into submission, and Poseidon is thus outvoted and Pisthetaerus' terms accepted. Pisthetaerus is proclaimed king of the gods and is presented with the lovely Sovereignty as his consort. The festive gathering departs amid the strains of a wedding march. Analysis Back to Top of Page The longest of Aristophanes ' surviving plays, �The Birds� is a fairly conventional example of Old Comedy, and has been acclaimed by some modern critics as a perfectly realized fantasy, remarkable for its mimicry of birds and for the gaiety of its songs. By the time of this production, in 414 BCE, Aristophanes had become recognized as one of Athens' leading comic playwrights.

Unlike the author's other early plays, it includes no direct mention of the Peloponnesian War, and there are relatively few references to Athenian politics, even though it was staged not long after the commencement of the Sicilian Expedition, an ambitious military campaign that had greatly increased Athenian commitment to the war effort. At that time, the Athenians in general were still optimistic about the future of the Sicilian Expedition, although there was still much ongoing controversy over it and its leader, Alcibiades. The play has been extensively analyzed over the years, and a great number of different allegorical interpretations have been offered, including identification of the Athenian people with the birds and their enemies with the Olympian gods; Cloud Cuckoo Land as a metaphor for the over-ambitious Sicilian Expedition, or alternatively as a comic representation of an ideal polis; Pisthetaerus as a representation of Alcibiades; etc.

There is, however, another view, that the play is nothing more than escapist entertainment, a graceful, whimsical theme chosen expressly for the sake of the opportunities it afforded for bright, amusing dialogue, pleasing lyrical interludes, and charming displays of brilliant stage effects and pretty dresses, with no serious political motif underlying the surface burlesque and buffoonery. Certainly, it is in a lighter vein than is usual for Aristophanes , and is largely (although not completely) unconnected with contemporary realities, suggesting that it may just have been an attempt on the dramatist's part to relieve the overwrought minds of his fellow citizens. As with most Old Comedy plays (and particlarly Aristophanes �) a huge number of topical references are incorporated into the play, including Athenian politicans, generals and personalities, poets and intellectuals, foreigners and historical and mythical figures.

The friendship between Pisthetaerus and Euelpides is portrayed quite realistically in spite of the unreality of their adventure, and is marked by their good-humoured teasing of each other's failings and by the ease with which they work together in difficult situations (although this is largely due to Euelpides' willingness to concede the initiative and leadership to Pisthetaerus). In this and other plays, Aristophanes demonstrates his ability to depict humanity convincingly in the most unconvincing of settings. Resources English translation (Internet Classics Archive): Greek version with word-by-word translation (Perseus Project):

Question: Which Greek dramatist wrote "The Birds", "The Frogs", "The Wasps", etc?
Answer: Aristophanes